It’s time to wrap up the second half of the season & boy it’s been a ride. If you need to catch up on the half-season progress report then STOP. Give it a read here and then come back.

Our start to the season was pretty inconsistent but I’d come to terms with that as 90% of the teams in this league are the same given the competitiveness & similar qualities each team possess. The key was to try and tip the scales over into securing more wins of course. Overall that’s exactly what we managed to do.

One thing we started to do with more regularity was find the back of the net. We scored 23 goals in our first 20 games whereas we smashed in 32 in the next 16 games, going from roughly 1 goal a game to 2. A nice jump. And we have to thank this fella for our upturn in fortunes -

I need to tell you how the season went but I wanted to focus on Franco (sounds like a good name for a tangent blog…) - I’ve tried to ensure he’s the main man this season and he hasn’t disappointed. He ended the season with 39 appearances, 8 goals & 18 assists with an average rating of 7.14. He covered more distance than any other player in the league, made more high intensity sprints than any other player in the league and his creative numbers were amongst the best.. He was a lot of fun to watch.

Another special mention has to go to retiring captain & veteran goalkeeper Jorge Carranza. It’s no coincidence that with him missing our first 9 games of the season we were a far better side once he returned from injury. Just the 9 clean sheets but there were some crucial saves in some key matches. At 41 he became our oldest ever player & bows out on a real high.

As our form improved, so did our fame (or so I like to think) as a certain someone was watching from afar…

As we hit July we made our first sale of the season; Diego Becker joined Club Necaxa for £350k. He was a talented AMC but I couldn’t give him enough game time to please him due to the form of a certain Franco Watson. This gave me a little space to bring in a few free agents.

Cortés came in as a replacement for Watson (but ended up with no game time so far). Mereles to add depth to my AMR role I currently had as a Winger on support. He was solid if unspectacular. But with zero investment bar wages I was happy to bring them in. They both became our first non-Argentinian players as well.

Standings

Well as you can see, those results really did catapult us up the table in the second half of the season. We floated around the top 5 but managed to sneak into second place on the last day of the season. Given how life started for me at IACC I really couldn’t see this finish so I was really pleased with how things had progressed.
This meant we had hit our target of making the playoffs - something I’ve not experienced before being my first time in Argentina so I wasn’t completely certain what the format was. As it happens the 2nd place finish meant we were highly seeded (steady) and go straight into the Playoff Semi-Finals. Whilst those teams finishing 12th to 3rd had to battle it out in a first and second round of knockout matches to have to chance to face IACC.

As it happens we were eventually drawn, in a two-legged affair, with San Martin (Tucumán). A team we faced away from home in the league season and lost 1-0. I was hopeful but bloody nervous - now that we’d got this far I really didn’t want to fall at one of the final hurdles.

We played the first leg at home and, quite frankly, we were terrible.

Despite plenty of the ball we were dreadful with it. Our goal was a pot shot from the edge of the box that squirmed in under the keeper. The one bit of luck we had in an otherwise pitiful display. I worried that hope was lost.

BUT NEVER GIVE UP HOPE PEOPLE! BELIEVE! Well, we were pretty awful again. Better, but definitely rode our luck in this game. Our defence just refused to concede they were phenomenal all averaging over 7.1 with Alarcón, our DC, winning 16(!) headers, 8 interceptions and 5 clearances. A player of the match performance.

Admittedly, when the game finished 1-0 I thought to myself, ‘what happens now?’ - extra time? Did we lose on away goals? Oh no readers. We were through, by the skin of our teeth and purely by being the higher seeded side. Argentina, how I love you.

Playoff Final

So somehow, despite everything that had happened this season, we were one game away from promotion. We faced Chicarita Juniors who again, we had lost 1-0 to in the league season. Our big match preparation was done and it was time to play.

Victory. Sweet, sweet victory. When they equalised right before half-time I really didn’t know which way the game would go. But we came out in that second half like we deserved that promotion. A 4-2 win. Let the carnival begin!

IACC were promoted. Ed Lasso, a hero. A truly landmark day in the history of this club. I’m really excited for next season. I hope promotion will help with our pretty worrying financial situation and also allow us to upgrade the squad as we will face far superior opposition next season.

My first season in Argentina and a truly rememberable one.